The Hindu Business Line : Rains may help robusta crop next season

Differing views
Rains will affect next crop due to flush growth, says growers’ federation.
Plantation sources maintain rains don’t matter for robustas.

Chennai, Feb. 13 Heavy rains witnessed in the coffee-growing regions in Karnataka are likely to help robusta coffee crop production next season starting October, according to plantation industry sources.

“There have been rains in areas such as Kodagu, Chikmagalur and Hassan from Sunday to Tuesday. This can be construed to be a good blossom shower for coffee, especially robustas, which need rains in February and a follow-up in late March or early April. These rains can actually help us reap a bumper crop,” said the sources.

Untimely rains

But the Karnataka Growers Federation (KGF) has a different angle altogether. “The coffee-growing areas have experienced untimely rains varying from 50-80 mm. In areas where blossom has occurred, some buds could flower during the next rains and this could lead to improper size of fruit. As a result, unsized ones will fall during monsoon and result in few fruits in the bunches,” the federation President, Dr N.K. Pradeep, said in a statement.

“The rains will drastically affect the next crop, which was expected to be good, due to flush growth. The showers will lead to growth of flush instead of helping coffee bud formation,” it said.

The federation Secretary, Mr H.T. Mohan Kumar, said even standing crop in most of the areas where harvest had not taken place would be affected. “Also, some of the harvested coffee which had been kept for drying has been washed away,” he told Business Line.

No significant damage seen

Plantation industry sources had a different peg to the development. Conceding that there were widespread rains in Kodagu, they said rains in Chikmagalur were “considerable”.

“These rains will not have much effect either on the standing crop or the ones awaiting blossom,” the sources, who did not wish to be identified, said.

A significant amount of arabica crop has been harvested, they said, adding that “only a small portion of the arabicas is unharvested and we don’t think there will be any significant damage.”

May tell on quality: KGF

KGF said nearly 50 per cent of the arabica crop had not been harvested and it could be hit.

According to industry sources, what could happen to the remaining crop of arabica due to the rains is that water content in the ripe berries could increase, leading to their splitting. “As a result, the quality could be affected a little,” they said.

KGF said the ripe berries would open up and subsequently fall, making growers suffer losses.

However, the rains would have little effect on the standing robusta crop. “The rains don’t matter for the robusta crop. At least 50 per cent of the crop is yet to be harvested,” they said.

“Had these rains come in March, we could have had problems with the arabica crop since the buds could have developed. There can be no damage now as they are not yet out,” the industry sources said.

KGF said over 50 per cent of the crop could be affected in many areas next season. It urged the Coffee Board to make a spot analysis along and assess the damage of the crop.

Production this season has been estimated at 2.62 lakh tonnes by the Coffee Board with arabica output being 92,500 tonnes and robusta the rest. This is against last year’s output of 2.88 lakh tonnes. This year’s production has been affected by heavy monsoon rains in Karnataka and to some extent due to white stem borer menace.

Exports up

On the other hand, the provisional exports figure during January 1-February 5 shows a rise to 16,382 tonnes against 15,967 tonnes during the same period a year ago. But this includes a higher re-export figure of 3,274 tonnes against 1,955 tonnes last year. While arabica plantation A is being offered a premium of $3 over New York rates, robusta parchment commands a premium of $530 over London prices.